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The Scottish National squad play
the opening games in their South
African tour this Monday with
clashes against Regional side
Guateng East and the Zimbabwe
national team.
Scotland then face their
toughest test in their clash
with South Africa later in the
week
Along with England, Australia,
India, New Zealand, Wales,
Zimbabwe, Ireland and hosts
South Africa, Scotland had been
set to take part in the 2nd
Commonwealth Korfball
Championships to be hosted on
the African continent, but the
withdrawal of the majority has
left the fledgling Scottish side
facing a series of friendly
matches against the national
teams of South Africa and
Zimbabwe and a number of South
African regional teams.
The collapse of the Commonwealth
tournament will be a blow to
Korfball's hopes of gaining
entry into the Commonwealth
games after the collapse of such
a high profile event and there
are of course questions now as
to whether the tournament now
has any future.
The withdrawal of the majority
of the nations at such a late
stage highlights the poor state
many find themselves in terms of
funding, with the players taking
part required to fund their
entire participation, which for
many represented a significant
outlay, a key factor in the
withdrawal of the majority of
many nations.
The development also raises of
course some questions as to the
organisation and planning on the
part of many of those who
pulled, bearing in mind that the
date for the tournament had been
agreed some time ago.
The English Korfball Association
were keen to support the
Commonwealth Championships,
having hosted the initial one,
but once it transpired that the
likes of Australia, New Zealand,
Wales, India and Ireland, had
withdrawn, the EKA were left
with the decision as to whether
to pull out or not. That
decision was it seems left for
the players themselves to
decide, bearing in mind it was
they who would be required to
fund the full cost of their
participation and the consensus
among the English players was
that the developments meant that
a much scaled down tournament
did not justify the financial
commitment.
That left the EKA had no choice
to join the other nations in
withdrawing from the
championships.
In
light of the worsening political
violence and recent events in
Zimbabwe and of course the
tensions in the region
generally, some have questioned
whether the Scottish team should
be playing against Zimbabwe at
all at such a time, but the
Scottish Korfball Association
remain fully committed to the
championships.
There has been no suggestion at
this stage that the political
tensions had anything to do with
the withdrawal of so many
nations from the event, but few
have made public there reasons.
The international matches will
be a tough test for new coach
Beth Bennett, who achieved some
success in the English national
league with Nottingham City, who
qualified last season for
European competition for the
first time in their history.
South Africa were ranked 13th in
the recent IKF World rankings in
which both Scotland and Zimbabwe
die not even feature.
In
their meeting at the 2006
Commonwealth Korfball
Championships in London South
Africa defeated Scotland by a
score of 18 - 4 and Scotland
went on to lose all of their
matches, including a 25 - 3
defeat a the hands of the 'old
enemy' England and a defeat
against the USA.
The question now is whether
Scottish Korfball has improved
in the past two years and that
question will likely be answered
next week
The somewhat inexperienced
Scottish squad is is made of
mostly of players from the
Scottish and Central England
leagues along with English
national league players Dan
Pratt from London club Croydon
and Tamara Burnell from
Supernova
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The Scotland Korfball Squad
Grant Calder (Capt) (Edinburgh
Mavericks)
Dan Pratt (Croydon)
Clive Minshull (Edinburgh City)
Wim Chalmet (Edinburgh City)
Danny Hesford (Edinburgh
Mavericks)
Matt Warren (Birmingham)
Duncan Maclachlan (Edinburgh
University)Anneli Mathews
(Edinburgh University)
Briony Murray (Manchester
Warriors)
Sam Hallam (Edinburgh
University)
Tamara Burnell (Supernova)
Lucy Storey (Edinburgh
Mavericks)
Naomi Reid (St Andrews
University)
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KorfballNet
28/6/08
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